MYO Gaskets

The tools you'll need are simple. Gasket paper - you can buy rolls of different thicknesses, look at how thick the old gasket was. When in doubt, use a weeties/cornflakes box. Don't laugh, they are perfect for most jobs. What's more one side is glossy and the other rough so when you separate the thing next time they always stick to just one side for easy removal!

Hammer and punches. A set of hand punches is dirt cheap, I think I paid about AUD$5 down at my local hardware. Scissors and a stanley knife are good. I use a tiny little pencil, a few centimetres long. You'll see why in a sec.

Right, grab the part, you will use it as a template. Clean it. I'm doing a motorbike rotor cover here. Roughly cut out enough gasket paper/weeties box to do the job, hold it in place. Using something blunt, say the back of your punches, feel where the holes need to be. When you find one, rub the gasket paper so it makes an indent where the hole is. Use your pencil if you can't see the dent well.

Mark 2 or 3 holes at opposite ends then take the gasket paper off. We will punch them first, then use them as locators for the rest of the holes.

Grab a punch that looks like the right size. Using a newspaper or a bit of wood as a backing, hold the punch on the dent/mark you've made, centred of course, and hit the back of the punch hard with your hammer. Viloa, a hole.

Now return your gasket to the object and put the bolts through so the gasket is held in place. If the holes were too small, use the next size up punch and make them bigger

All the holes are punched, put the gasket back on the object and put bolts in all the holes. How did you go? All bolts and holes lined up perfect? Well done.

Now grab your little pencil and upsidedown roughly scribe around the outside of the object. Cut with the scissors a rough big hole on the inside of the object - and again use the little pencil to roughly scribe the inside of the object. You can see now why a little pencil is good.

Whip it off and you now have a rough guide to the shape of the object. Use your scissors and knife if need be and cut it out. I find that you don't have to be super accurate - if a bit of gasket paper is popping out so what. You can always trim it when the object is bolted back on.

On the inside however, where oil and petrol and stuff is, try to keep it accurate. The last thing you want is a bit of gasket dag paper breaking off and clogging up some oil gallery.

That's it, you're done. No more driving to the shops and spending $20 each time you take something apart. Of course, make sure each surface on the object is nice and clean before reassembling to stop leaks - use your knife to scrape off any old gasket or silicone. I try to never use silicone on my gaskets, you shouldn't have to. Only when things are more warped than they should be will you need silicone.

Well I said it was probably a bit silly telling you this, but maybe I've taught you a trick you might not have thought of before - Good Luck!